Homecoming - Trilogy of Anson Mak’s Experimental Documentary
22 - 24/2/2021
How does the idea of Homecoming hit you? When floating on the sea? When your thoughts linger? Being tossed by work? On hospital bed? Right before death? After we miss something important? Or, is it the mere moment when we resume awareness of being carried away by outside phenomena?
This programme revisits various methods and inspiration of Anson Mak’s artworks by screening four significant experimental documentaries including her latest film:
One-way Street On A Turntable (2007) experiments forms of essay film to explore the very first homes of two women and the notion of home as well as Hong Kong as home. The screening also includes a short film, Who’s Afraid of Ghosts!? (2009) which was created right before the redevelopment plan of Kwun Tong town centre. With the unique texture of Super 8 film, the work re-inscribes childhood memories of Hungry Ghosts Festival and emotions to the Kwun Tong community.
On The Edge Of A Floating City, We Sing (2012) studies spatial narratives and is a collaboration with local independent musicians. Ah P of My Little Airport (Kwun Tong Industrial Building), Dejay (Shek Yam Estate) and Billy of Mininoise (public square next to Hong Kong Cultural Center in Tsim Sha Tsui) genuinely tell stories about homes, communities history and spatial stories. In the streets, they sang. Urban space is also the space of the emotions and the mind.
Fear(less) and Dear (2020) echoes with nowadays Hong Kong. We have undergone such traumatic experiences over the past year. Perhaps it is time to return to our inner home, the most peaceful, reliable and powerful home - our mind.
Please let us all go home!
【Notice for Homecoming - Trilogy of Anson Mak’s Experimental Documentary】
In comply with the latest Prevention and Control of Disease (Requirements and Directions) (Business and Premises) Regulation (Cap. 599F) requirements, “Homecoming - Trilogy of Anson Mak’s Experimental Documentary” screening programme originally on 15, 16 and 17 December 2020 will be postponed to 22, 23 and 24 February 2021. For audience with purchased ticket(s), you may choose between the below options:
1/ If you wish to join the postponed screenings, please keep your e-tickets and present it at the entrance of the cinema for your specific screening title:
For any enquiries, please contact us via email mi01@hkac.org.hk
Thank you for your understanding.
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Screening schedule
22/2 (Mon) 8pm One-Way Street On A Turntable + Who’s Afraid Of Ghosts!?*
22/2 (Mon) 8pm One-Way Street On A Turntable + Who’s Afraid Of Ghosts!?*
23/2 (Tue) 8pm On The Edge of A Floating City, We Sing
Programme 1|One-Way Street On A Turntable + Who’s Afraid Of Ghosts!?
22/2 (Mon) 8pm*
*Director Anson Mak and documentary film director Cheuk Cheung will attend the after-screening talk via Zoom (Conducted in Cantonese).
One Way Street On A Turntable
Hong Kong | 2007 | 74’ | In Cantonese, English & Mandarin with Chinese & English subtitles | Digital video | B/W, Color
2007 Hong Kong International Film Festival
2007 Vancouver International Film Festival
2007 Singapore International Film Festival
2007 Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival
2007 Taipei Film Festival
2008 Beijing Independent Film Forum
2007 Vancouver International Film Festival
2007 Singapore International Film Festival
2007 Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival
2007 Taipei Film Festival
2008 Beijing Independent Film Forum
This film is about how people understand Hong Kong and Hong Kongers, and how we understand ourselves, as Hong Kongers.
Tracing personal histories from spatial memories, the film juxtaposes two stories on first homes – the local-born director’s first home in Kwun Tong, and the actress’s home in Mei Foo Sun Chuen, where she settled as a new immigrant from China in Hong Kong in the 1980s. One-way street on a Turntable explores an alternative way to tell Hong Kong history and Hong Kongers' changing identities, that have been existing between moving and rootedness.
Screen with Anson Mak’s Short Film: Who's Afraid Of Ghosts!?
Tracing personal histories from spatial memories, the film juxtaposes two stories on first homes – the local-born director’s first home in Kwun Tong, and the actress’s home in Mei Foo Sun Chuen, where she settled as a new immigrant from China in Hong Kong in the 1980s. One-way street on a Turntable explores an alternative way to tell Hong Kong history and Hong Kongers' changing identities, that have been existing between moving and rootedness.
Screen with Anson Mak’s Short Film: Who's Afraid Of Ghosts!?
Hong Kong | 2009 | 15’ | No dialogue and subtitles | single-channel Super 8mm film and DV tape transferred to digital video | B/W, Color
2009 Cambridge Super 8 Film Festival, Best Sound Prize
The film was done in 2008. Through re-exploring Ghost Festival, this experimental documentary expresses the artist’s revisits to childhood experience and her concern of urban re-development plan (2009-2023) to the old community - Kwun Tong. An experimental auto-ethnography fabricated by poetic moving images and soundscape design. Ghost Festival, traditionally stresses the good will to pay tribute to ancestors, to histories, to help the poor and save all from suffering. Who's afraid of ghosts now!? and what will be the good will…when the community has experienced drastic changes…
The film was done in 2008. Through re-exploring Ghost Festival, this experimental documentary expresses the artist’s revisits to childhood experience and her concern of urban re-development plan (2009-2023) to the old community - Kwun Tong. An experimental auto-ethnography fabricated by poetic moving images and soundscape design. Ghost Festival, traditionally stresses the good will to pay tribute to ancestors, to histories, to help the poor and save all from suffering. Who's afraid of ghosts now!? and what will be the good will…when the community has experienced drastic changes…
Programme 2|On The Edge Of A Floating City, We Sing
23/2 (Tue) 8pm
On The Edge Of A Floating City, We Sing
Hong Kong | 2012 | 120’ | In Cantonese with English subtitles | Digital video | Color
2012 Hong Kong International Film Festival
2012 Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival
2012 South Film Festival
A reflexive documentary about the notion of freedom via spatial stories and local indie music.
Ah P from My Little Airport performs rm1210 in various streetscape in Kwun Tong area to tell how messy rents and situations have become due to the “revitalization policy” of the government.
Dejay from The Pancakes chose Shek Yam Estate where she lived as a kid. Revisiting lost space echoes with memories. The imagined space narrates her childhood stories. Together with the photos and stories from other Shek Yam residents, we see how they creatively invented plays within limited space that tell so much about Hong Kong in its 70’s and 80’s.
Billy from Mininoise chose the square outside Hong Kong Cultural Centre in Tsim Sha Tsui. The sculpture and the square has turned into a place symbolize freedom. And indeed, the square is a free space. Since 1999, Billy has been playing the same song every year in the concert at the square in memory of June Forth Incident (democratic movement in China in 1989). It is not a song about the past but, the future.
Programme 3|Fear(less) and Dear
24/2 (Wed) 8pm*
*Director Anson Mak and documentary film director Chan Tze Woon will attend the after-screening talk via Zoom (Conducted in Cantonese).
2012 Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival
2012 South Film Festival
A reflexive documentary about the notion of freedom via spatial stories and local indie music.
Ah P from My Little Airport performs rm1210 in various streetscape in Kwun Tong area to tell how messy rents and situations have become due to the “revitalization policy” of the government.
Dejay from The Pancakes chose Shek Yam Estate where she lived as a kid. Revisiting lost space echoes with memories. The imagined space narrates her childhood stories. Together with the photos and stories from other Shek Yam residents, we see how they creatively invented plays within limited space that tell so much about Hong Kong in its 70’s and 80’s.
Billy from Mininoise chose the square outside Hong Kong Cultural Centre in Tsim Sha Tsui. The sculpture and the square has turned into a place symbolize freedom. And indeed, the square is a free space. Since 1999, Billy has been playing the same song every year in the concert at the square in memory of June Forth Incident (democratic movement in China in 1989). It is not a song about the past but, the future.
Programme 3|Fear(less) and Dear
24/2 (Wed) 8pm*
*Director Anson Mak and documentary film director Chan Tze Woon will attend the after-screening talk via Zoom (Conducted in Cantonese).
Fear(less) and Dear
Hong Kong | 2020 | 106’ | In Cantonese with Chinese & English subtitles | DCP | Color
2020 Busan International Film Festival
2020 Hong Kong Asian Film Festival
2020 Hong Kong Asian Film Festival
Since the summer of 2019, Hong Kong has been going through one of the toughest periods of its history due to a political movement sparked by the government’s controversial extradition bill and the COVID-19 pandemic that has swept the globe. How do young parents feel? What do they think about their kids and the next generation? Director and visual artist Anson Mak invites three local artists, who are also parents—performing artist and district councillor Clara Cheung, political comic artist Justin Wong and writer Cheung Yuen-man—to genuinely share their stories regarding the notion of fear. Their artworks also powerfully respond to political unrest and personal innermost emotions, as this film in itself.
Facebook: www.facebook.com/FearlessandDear
Tickets are now available at popticket.hk.
Ticket price: $80 / 64*
*Full-time students and senior citizens aged 60 or above, people with disabilities and the minder, Comprehensive Social Security Assistance (CSSA) recipients, HKAC Bee members and HKAC/ HKAS Staff. Concessionary tickets are available on a first come, first served basis. Ticket holders must present proof of eligibility on admission.
*For each purchase of 4 or more standard tickets.
The following measures will be implemented for all screenings, to combat the prevailing threat of Novel Coronavirus:
- All audience must wear face masks
- Cinema staff have the right to deny the admission of any person with temperature higher than 37.5°C
Ticketing enquiry: ask@popticket.hk (Office hour: Mon-Fri 10am-7pm)
Programme enquiry: 2582 0248
Co-organised by: Hong Kong Arts Centre & First Light Images
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